Major League Baseball Races on Aug 23

As I had hinted at a month ago, I am once again examining the races in the various MLB divisions, especially as they apply to teams I am following. Here goes:

The best race in baseball involves teams I generally root for: the New York Yankees lead the Tampa Bay Rays by a game in the American League East, with the Boston Red Sox six and a half back and Tampa's main challenger in the wild-card playoff position race (the three divisional winners, plus the best second-place team, make the playoffs in each league). We're at the stage in the 162-game regular season when there are 37-39 games left to go, so although time is dwindling away, there is still nevertheless time for a currently-lagging team to make a serious move for contention with a surge. And the Red Sox have historically been a surging team. We'll see how they do this time around.

In the AL Central, the Minnesota Twins have pulled away to a five-game lead over my Chicago White Sox, something that I had expected to happen. The Detroit Tigers have badly faded out of contention. In the West, Texas seems poised to run away with that title.

The National League East has the Atlanta Braves in a tight race against Philadelphia, leading the Phillies now by only two and a half games. Florida and the NY Mets are essentially out of it, playing around .500 ball this late in the season. The Central contains a surprise: Cincinnati is ahead of St. Louis by three and a half games; I had expected the Cardinals to already be pulling away in this division. My Chicago Cubs have faded badly at 51-74. The West has San Diego strongly expanding their first-place margin to a big eight-games over the rest of the pack. The three second place teams Philadelphia, St. Louis, and the San Francisco Giants are also in the thick of the race for that wild-card National League slot.

It is in the East in both leagues where most of my interest lies. In the NL, it is a simple matter of me rooting for Atlanta and against Philadelphia. But since I like both the Yankees and Rays, my main concern in the AL is that Boston suddenly doesn't get a long winning streak going and knock one of them out of the playoffs at the end of the regular season.

I'll see if I can't check out how the standings are going a month from now as well. By then we should have a pretty clear picture of who is going on into the playoffs and who will be looking forward to next year.